ROMOHERRERA Sells $20,000 Metal Sculptures With Zero Website Visitors

Cristina Romo and Eduardo Herrera are the founders of ROMOHERRERA, a Mexican art and design house in Taxco el Viejo, Guerrero. They create jewelry, home objects and sculptural works in metal, exploring the relationship between art, design and function. Cristina is the third generation of a family of silversmiths; Eduardo studied architecture in Mexico City and has won national jewelry awards in 2012, 2015 and 2022.

Cristina and Eduardo begin every piece with drawings or shapes made by hand, and their team in Taxco el Viejo fabricates it. Eduardo designs in layers and resolves the joints so a piece can move; Cristina often starts with a form drawn or modeled in clay. They melt the metal themselves – tumbaga, copper and silver – and keep the hammer marks. A ring takes four or five days; a large wall sculpture, two months.

ROMOHERRERA often accepts commissions, always in its own design language – they do not simply manufacture somebody else’s design. A client who saw one of their leaf designs at ZONA MACO asked for an illuminated wall installation for a hotel; they spent several months on it, bending each piece differently, and it is now finished and awaiting installation. They ship worldwide and work with interior designers and architects on trade terms.

ROMOHERRERA finds customers face to face: at ZONA MACO, the art and design fair in Mexico City, through hotels and retail partners, and through collectors and galleries. Online barely figures – Google showed 0 visitors to their website over three months. People often contact them on WhatsApp after seeing the work. They usually receive two or three orders a month, and a single order can be a significant sale.

Cristina Romo is the third generation of a family of silversmiths. As a child, she sat beside her mother, Emilia Castillo, making little wax sculptures and learning to work with her hands and simple tools. Some of her drawings were made into copper and silver objects and sold to her parents’ customers – including through her mother’s appearances at Neiman Marcus stores in the United States.

Eduardo Herrera studied architecture in Mexico City. He met Cristina on a trip with friends, and in 2009 they started their relationship. Eduardo began visiting her in Taxco el Viejo, where she worked in the administration of her parents’ brand – spending her days behind a computer rather than designing. At the time, Eduardo was interested in designing chairs; during one visit he met a blacksmith and began making prototypes of forged-metal chairs with him.

One day Cristina’s father, Roberto, suggested that Eduardo try designing a piece of jewelry, simply to explore another way of creating. Eduardo spent a week in the workshops. Seeing one of his drawings become a metal object made such an impression on him that he took a jewelry course. Six or seven months later, he left Mexico City and moved to this small town, about two and a half hours away. “His whole life changed.”

When they began their life together, Cristina reconnected with her creative side and soon started designing her own pieces. They established their workshop around 2012. In 2014 they rented a tiny space in the Condesa neighborhood of Mexico City, opening it themselves on weekends and traveling back and forth from Taxco el Viejo. They still live and work in the countryside, with two children and a small farm where they raise chickens, collect eggs, grow some of their food and compost. In 2021 they founded an educational project for children in their community.

Everything begins with drawings or shapes made by hand. The pieces are then fabricated by the team in Taxco el Viejo. Cristina and Eduardo work quite differently. Eduardo, perhaps because of his architectural background, designs in layers: he starts with the overall shape and then resolves the joints and connections so the piece can move. Much of his jewelry is articulated and made from detailed plans. Cristina often begins with a three-dimensional form, drawn or modeled in clay, then works alongside the team, shaping sheets of metal into the final object.

The team is an essential part of ROMOHERRERA. Some of their colleagues are farmers, blacksmiths or construction workers, and much of their metalworking knowledge has been passed down through generations. “We value not only their skills and experience, but also who they are.” Don José García, the longest-serving member of the workshop, is pictured above, preparing to solder elements together.

Most of what they make is in metal: tumbaga (an alloy of copper and zinc), copper and silver. They melt metals themselves and use a rolling mill to produce sheet metal and wire. There is no standard production time. Some rings or earrings take four or five days; a large wall sculpture might take two months, with several people participating – and that is after the design itself, which can take months. They work with hand saws, hammers, clamps and other simple tools, alongside specialized equipment.

They pay close attention to detail, but do not pursue an immaculate, industrial-looking finish. Hammer marks, traces of the anvil and the behavior of the metal are part of the work. Even when they make a design more than once, no two pieces are exactly alike.

Video: ROMOHERRERA

The workshops are surrounded by nature. “Alongside hammers striking metal and the sound of a torch, we hear birds, wind, donkeys and, quite often, the firecrackers that are part of local celebrations.” In the rainy season there is the smell of damp earth; at other times, wood smoke drifts from traditional kitchens. All of this enters the work.

One story captures their way of seeing things. When they were starting out, they were walking along a beach and found the remains of a dead crab. Cristina picked them up, placed them around her wrist and said, “Look, a bracelet!” They never actually made that bracelet. Now, when the family walks in the countryside, their children pick up stones, leaves or flowers and say, “Look, an earring!” or “This could be a ring!” “It is not about turning everything into a product,” they say. “It is about being present and noticing the possibilities in ordinary things.” Eduardo later designed a necklace called Crab, inspired by that visual impression rather than a literal reproduction.

Metal darkens and develops a patina over time; the pieces continue to change after they leave the workshop. “Nothing stays exactly as it was.”

EON, an articulated vase made primarily of copper with tumbaga and silver elements, explores the idea of a timeless creature, constantly changing and transforming. ONAGADORI, a wearable art piece, takes its name from the Japanese Onagadori rooster, known for its extraordinarily long tail feathers. Photos: Tonatiuh Díaz (@invictvsmx), Mauricio Sierra (@mauricio_sierra_), Eduardo Herrera.

Interior designers, art collectors and people who love design. ROMOHERRERA’s wall sculptures and illuminated installations have been acquired for private collections and interiors, and even gallery directors have bought their pieces. Most customers are in Mexico and the US. The price range is very wide: commercial earrings start at $180; wall sculptures or wearable art can sell for $20,000.

At art fairs, many sales happen after someone has spoken with them directly. “We like being ourselves – open, sincere and honest – and those conversations often make a difference.” Commissions come the same way: once, the grandmother of a bride wanted a spectacular jewelry set for a wedding, and Eduardo designed a unique set for her.

In Mexico City, their work can be seen in the LAGO stores, the main one on Masaryk in Polanco; LAGO also has a store in Los Cabos. Their pieces are also sold at MoMo Santa Fe Gallery in the US and at the Belmond Maroma hotel in Cancún.

Their earliest customers came through antique galleries and the art-collecting community. In May 2011 Eduardo started his own brand, and by November he had organized an exhibition attended by collectors of art and antiques. His father had collected art for decades, so Eduardo had grown up around artists and collectors. His two earliest pieces – a necklace and a bracelet – were bought by an antiques dealer as gifts for his wife.

Through that circle, other collectors visited Eduardo’s small boutique. One introduced him to Penny Morrill, an important figure in the history of Mexican silver. She loved his work and acquired several pieces – including through an exchange for antique silver by Los Castillo, the workshop founded by Cristina’s grandfather, Antonio Castillo, in the 1940s. Years later, she included Eduardo and Cristina in her book “Dreaming in Silver”.

When Cristina began designing professionally again in 2012, her earliest customers also came largely through word of mouth and the galleries and collectors they knew. Invitations to exhibitions and competitions followed. In 2014 they founded CREH, their original shared design project; in late 2017 they renamed it ROMOHERRERA.

“Face-to-face conversations, especially at fairs, have been much more important than online advertising.” ROMOHERRERA sells through hotels and other retail partners and participates regularly in ZONA MACO, the art and design fair in Mexico City. What has worked best is meeting people directly: exhibitions, art fairs, collectors and relationships that develop through conversation.

People often contact them directly through WhatsApp after seeing the work, and occasionally buy through their Shopify website. Instagram brings relatively few direct customers. They don’t have a reliable percentage for any single channel – “we are still a small business.”

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“We are much better at designing than at selling!” They have spent money on advertising, graphic design and websites that did not bring the results they hoped for. They have had three or four versions of their website and know it still needs work; their kind of work is not always easy to communicate or sell online. They also paid for Instagram and Facebook advertising, including hiring a team to manage campaigns, but the results did not justify the expense.

They once paid a design office for advice on the name CREH, but in the end it was they who decided to change it, and Cristina designed the logo herself. “These experiences taught us how important it is to stay involved in decisions about our own identity, even when time is scarce.”

They have submitted pieces they were proud of to competitions and not even reached the final selection – ONAGADORI was created for the LOEWE Foundation Craft Prize and was not selected as a finalist. “We know nobody is obliged to like what we do, but we are human and of course it can hurt.”

There was also LOOT, the jewelry event at the Museum of Arts and Design in New York. They had been invited, but the pandemic disrupted the plans. When the event was rescheduled, they were invited again – and about a month beforehand were told that only designers based in the United States could participate, as a health precaution. They had already spent money on travel. Later, visiting the museum on their own, they saw international designers participating. “We never fully understood the decision, and at the time it was painful and discouraging.”

Have they ever wanted to quit? “Hahaha, many times! Not because we have stopped believing in the work, but because creating costs money, and sales have not always been enough to give us peace of mind.” Cristina loves studying history and politics; Eduardo loves literature and philosophy and has written several manuscripts, hoping to publish someday. “These interests are a kind of shock absorber for the mind.”

“Our story has not had one single turning point. We get excited, move forward, stall, and then start again.” There were moments of recognition that gave them confidence. In 2012 Eduardo won the top prize in the jewelry category of the Hugo Salinas Price National Award; in 2015 he received it again, this time for the best piece overall. His work was exhibited at the Museo de Arte Popular and acquired by the Hugo Salinas Price Foundation. In 2022 he received the Galardón Nacional at the Feria Nacional de la Plata, the annual silverwork competition in Taxco.

Another important change was becoming a family. Their elder child was born in March 2017. That year they applied to ZONA MACO and were initially rejected. They kept talking with the organizers, were eventually accepted – and were encouraged to reconsider the name. CREH had always been difficult to pronounce (“almost nobody could pronounce it!”). In November 2017 they became ROMOHERRERA. The change was not only graphic: they joined their workshops, shared their team and organized the business as one project. They made their debut under that name at ZONA MACO in 2018.

The years after 2020 were difficult financially, but they also gave them time to reflect on their relationship with Taxco el Viejo. Their second child was born in 2020, and in 2021 they started the educational project for children in the community. “We began to feel more deeply rooted here.”

They want Instagram to work more as a window into their world than as a paid advertising channel – posting consistently and improving the website, while keeping the content personal. They are considering ChatGPT as an adviser on communication and strategy, “but we want to remain responsible for the ideas, photographs and stories we share.”

“Do we still want recognition? Of course. But not simply for fame.” They want the studio to be financially stable enough to keep creating work they believe in. They dream of reaching more collectors, selling more of their sculptural work and welcoming people to Taxco el Viejo – to see the workshops, experience the countryside and perhaps one day stay for a few days.

ROMOHERRERA

ROMOHERRERA is an independent art and design studio based in Taxco el Viejo, Mexico. Working alongside a team of skilled local makers, we create jewelry, sculptural objects and works of art in metal, drawing inspiration from nature, everyday life and traditional metalworking techniques.

Who: Cristina Romo and Eduardo Herrera (ROMOHERRERA)
What: Jewelry, home objects and sculptural works in metal
Where: Taxco el Viejo, Guerrero, Mexico
Started: 2014 as CREH; ROMOHERRERA since November 2017
Audience: Small – 0 website visitors in the last 3 months (Google)
Customers: Around 2–3 orders a month
Price range: $180–$20,000
Custom orders: Yes
Ships: Worldwide
Works with designers: Yes, with trade terms
Channels: Word of Mouth & Offline